In our digital age, what people say about you online really can make or break your business. Reviews and recommendations are the one-stop-shop for consumers who haven’t yet made a decision about which hotel to lodge at while on vacation or what restaurant to dine at tomorrow night. While smart marketers enable SEO as a part of their marketing strategy, they’re not yet familiar with what is online reputation management and how it can help protect their brand reputation.
If you’re in the market for a new L-shaped couch or a smoothie blender, you’re going to do your due diligence by researching competitors online. Online reputation management (ORM) experts can ensure that companies’ branded keywords reveal the positive elements of their brand on the first page of Google. Here’s exactly how they do it:
- They Take a Swiffer to Google’s First Page: Does a slanderous press release haunt the first or second ranking on Google under your branded keywords? Through proven content marketing tactics, ORM experts create loads of unique articles and send them to their network of bloggers to be posted as backlink juice. Essentially, the ORM specialist places anchor texts with your specific keyword in each article, linking back to a desired positive result on the first page. After a few months (depending on the severity of the case), Google will eventually place more prominence on the positive results and rank it above the unwanted press release.
- They Put You on the Map: The backbone of ORM is SEO, a vital strategy used to get Google to notice your brand. The more prominence you have on the SERP, the more business you’ll be generating. ORM specialists will create microsites, social profiles and local listings for your company to rank high on. Maintaining a digital presence will entice more consumers to write reviews about your company, resulting in greater customer trust and brand credibility.
- They Protect Your Brand Long-Term: Companies such as internetreputation.services make it their mission to protect brands’ reputation in the long-run. They do this by securing microsites for their clients with their branded keywords as the domains. After the client is pleased with the suppression work that was done on the negative results, it is highly recommended for clients to keep their domains in case other bad press releases come along. The more branded online properties you can secure, the greater chance you have in protecting your reputation from slander.
We live in a time where business cards are replaced by a quick Google search. Online reputation management is not a luxury, it is a necessity for both e-retailers and brick-and-mortars. If you work in a competitive profession such as dentistry or medicine, you no longer have a reason to stay up at night worrying about your reputation if you can hire an ORM agency to take care of your qualms. Your reputation is the most sensitive and vulnerable asset that you own. Protect it wisely with online reputation management.
